Posts

PrestaShop is based on open source platform for e-commerce which provides smooth shopping cart system with control over the look and functionality of the store. It is growing in the e-commerce market day by day. More traders are using this platform for their e-store. It provides various feature for an e-commerce store , you can check its features in our previous blog. With the increase in the e-commerce stores, mobile-commerce has also become popular these days. Mobile visits account for one-third of e-commerce sites traffic. To have an e-commerce mobile app for electronic commerce store is like putting a retail outlet in the customer’s pocket . PrestaShop provides SEO, items management, and other tools which enforce traders to have the mobile app for superb shopping experience for customers. In this blog, I am going to discuss some important features i.e searching , sorting and filtering implementation in the Prestashop mobile app.

Let me first start with the basics. PrestaShop system API is constructed by principle CRUD (Create, Read, Update, Delete). All methods are to be called through the /api/ gateway. Most methods can be accessed in a REST manner, with the 5 main HTTP request methods: HEAD, GET, POST, PUT, DELETE.

How to Search products in PrestaShop mobile app using REST API

search can only be accessed using GET and HEAD in PrestaShop API . Following the syntax for retrieving searched data or product :

/api/method/?filter[parameter name to search]=[parameter value to search]

for example- let search a product by its name , then its request call will be like :

/api/products/?display=full&filter[name]=[Blouse]

This call will return the product full details with the name “Blouse”. In the above syntax “parameter name to search” can be anything that products method has in its schema. You can search as many numbers of values at a time i.e :

How to Sort products in PrestaShop mobile app using REST API

/api/method/?sort=[sort by field with the suffix _ASC _DESC or in the order]

for example- let sort products by its name , then its request call will be like :

/api/products/?display=full&sort=[name_ASC]

This call will return the product in ascending order of ‘name’ with all details.

/api/products/?display=full&sort=[price_DESC]

How to Filter products in PrestaShop mobile app using REST API

Following the syntax for filtering data or products :

/api/method/?filter[field]=[value1|value2]

Above syntax filter “field” with value between ‘value1 ” and “value2”

/api/method/?filter[field]=[value1,value2...]

Above syntax filter field for values specified between brackets

/api/method/?filter[field]=[value]%

Above syntax filter “columns” for values containing “value”

for example- let filter products by its ids then its request call will be like :
/api/products/?display=full&filter[id]=[1,10] – This will list the products with id 1 to 10.

/api/products/?display=full&filter[id]=[1|5] – This will list all the products between 1 to 5

/api/products/?display=full&filter[name]=[appl]% – This will list all the products name starting with “Appl”.

NOTE: In the above all calls “display=full” means it will display all product details. You can display your product according to your choice. For example – “display=[birthday]” will display only the birthday.

Conclusion

As the implementation of PrestaShop framework is increasing day by day for the e-commerce stores , demand for mobile-commerce is also increasing with the same speed and popularity. So developing an e-commerce mobile app is becoming common and for any e-commerce store searching, sorting and filtering are very common and powerful property. Keeping these all things in mind I wrote this article to help the new developer for PrestaShop. I hope this will help you… :-). Below is our sample app based on Prestashop REST API, you can refer it as an example which has shown the use of sort, search and filter APIs.

Prestashopee
The PrestaShopee mobile app developed using native platforms that gels well with all mobile devices.It has used PrestaShop’s APIs for data. Further performance wise your app will be steadfast and hence customers are assured of a quick shopping experience.

References

Prestashop is a free open-source which provides the solution for e-commerce. For more information, you can visit the following link PrestaShop.

PrestaShop provides documentation for the list of all basic APIs that are needed for the e-store.To get more details about the documentation you can visit this link PrestaShop Webservice

Average Order Value (AOV) is the measure of how much money your customers spend each time they place an order through your online store. It’s a simple calculation (revenue ÷ number of orders = AOV) that can reveal a lot about your customers and your business during a specific time period.
Getting customers to buy multiple items and spend more money on each order is a great way to increase sales and revenue. Thus, online retailers that are able to increase average order value(AOV) should also become more profitable.

This statistic provides information on the average order value of U.S. online shopping orders from the second quarter of 2012 to the first quarter of 2016. During the most recent quarter, online orders which were placed from a desktop device had an average value of 75.9 U.S. dollars.

Why Focus on Increasing AOV?

To increase revenue and cash flow. Improving AOV is a great way to get healthy cash flow back into your store without having to spend a lot of money. In fact, you don’t need to worry if your store gets less traffic, you will have higher revenues due to increased AOV.

Tips to increase average order value

1. Product Bundles: Product bundling makes buying multiple items at once easy. Bundles often group a primary product and its accessories (such as a Mobile Phone that can be matched with Mobile case and a headphone etc); or products that are used for a similar purpose (such as a jacket, scarf and gloves).

2. Up-Sell and Cross-Sell:

Up-Sell – Suggest a larger or more expensive version of a product a customer is viewing.
For example, If the customer is looking at your shoes, suggest a similarly styled shoes at a higher price point.

Cross-Sell – Suggest additional items related to the one your customer is viewing. For example, If the customer is looking at a mobile phone, recommend a matching case or screen guard of mobile phone.

Rewards Points – Rewarding customers with points for spending more money on your site is a great
way to increase AOV while at the same time fostering customer loyalty. The more customers buy, the
more points they earn. Points can later be redeemed for discounts, free gifts, and other incentives.

4. Implement a free shipping: How frequently have you seen offers such as “free shipping when you spend over $49.99” when shopping online? It’s like a game against the total for online shoppers. They will keep throwing products into their cart until they reach the point where they gain free shipping. A win for your customers, and for you!

5. Easy Returns: One of the biggest concerns customers have about shopping online is whether or not they can return the items they purchase. If a customer thinks that returning something will be costly or difficult, he/she will buy fewer items to minimize their return risk. However, research shows that the more items customers buy, the more they actually keep (meaning they don’t return more items when the process is easy, they just want to know that easy returns are an option).

Conclusion

The strategies outlined here are all very different in how they get customers to increase the amount they spend in every order. Implement these strategies to your online and start noticing an increase in the average order value of your store.Thus this is the way to make more revenue with less traffic.

eCommerce is the boosting of trading in products or services using the internet. There are many eCommerce platforms like PrestaShop,WooCommerce, OpenCart, JigoShop and many more available. These platforms provide all kind of solution for clients. Though there are many platforms but Prestashop is most growing and vastly used by online stores. In this article, we explain 9 things about Prestashop store that your retailer wants to know.

Prestashop based on open source platform which provides smooth shopping cart system with control over the look and functionality of the store. It is a strong, extendable plugin that helps you to sell anything efficiently. It provides SEO, items management, and other tools which enforce trader to have the mobile app for superb shopping experience for customers. Here is the list of features which explain the benefits of Prestashop and reasons why you need Prestashop store.

Key reasons to choose Prestashop store :

1. Open source –It is an open source platform. It means that the software is free to be used, modified, and distributed. This affects many things, from the ability for you to use PrestaShop freely on your next client project, to support given by the PrestaShop community as it is open, scalable, and constantly being improved. Open source enables developers, designers, and everyday people to tweak It. It builds functionality on top of this platform.

3. Web Services API –With v1.6, It includes a REST API that allows store data to be accessed in either JSON or XML format. It allows developers to easily create, modify, and grow a store that meets their specifications.

5.Checkout,Payment, and Shipping – This platform provides the functionality of one-page checkout with an additional feature of guest checkout or checkout with Gift messages / wrapping. Integrates with any payment provider through modules and Payment gateway filtered by currency Shipping fees by weight or price with Unlimited carriers and destinations to fine-tune your shipping options.

6. Security – Security is, of course, a big concern when it comes to running an online store, and this platform is serious about making their software as secure as possible. It supports SSL web hosting, password and cookie encryption, PCI compliance, Track employee activity, Set security permissions for each employee.

8. Customer Management – Create orders from the Back Office, Create customer accounts from the Back Office, Modify shopping carts after orders placed, Send welcome emails upon registration, Customer contact history. These features make PrestaShop pretty good in the management of customer.

9. Translations / Localisation – This is the best feature in this platform. It is Available in 41 languages and Allow customer to choose the language. Its Geolocation – settings are based on your customer’s location. Address format set as customer’s country.

Conclusion

In above article, we explained benefits of using Prestashop store your retailer should know. It is third after Magento and woocommerce covering eCommerce market. Those looking for a robust and powerful eCommerce solution need to not look beyond Prestashop. From start-up businesses to large-scale enterprises, Prestashop can cater to all for the most stringent of their eCommerce needs. There are ready to go solution for mobile also like

We provide solutions to the client by building apps according to their requirements. We developed many apps on many different frameworks like SocialEngine, Magento, Woocommerce etc. Recently we got a new project from one of our clients. Their requirement was to develop an e-commerce app for their e-store which was on PrestaShop platform. Prestashop is a free open-source e-commerce solution. So the point was we have to build PrestaShop mobile app for their store using web-services.

As PrestaShop REST API was new for us and we knew that we would get problems during our implementation, but it would start at the first step was not expected 🙁 . We started the implementation and the first problem that we faced was how to build Prestashop mobile app. We can also say it as how to access Prestashop Webservice. Every time we hit the API , it gave “401 Unauthorized” and message “The server says welcome to Prestashop Webservice, please enter the authentication key as login. No password required”.
We did a lot of research, googled it, also found some solutions like – use the API key (The API key serves as the main identifier for the web service account you are creating) at the start of the URL

but every approach was fruitless. We tried every possible method to send the API Key with URL so that it can authorise the web service but nothing happened. The main confusing point was when we were hitting the URL directly on the browser by putting API Key at the start of URL it was working. Then after working several hours we found the solution. Before describing the solution I would like to list some essential points need to work on while accessing Prestashop Webservice :

Points to revisit before you start to build PrestaShop mobile app.

Authentication key : This the most important key. Using this API key, the selected users will be able to access the web service. This key is provided by the server side. It is needed to send with the API.

Permission for Resources : This is very important, as it enables the resources you want to make available to your user. These permissions are enabled from the server side.

To build Prestashop mobile app first you have to access its Webservice, so, you need to provide your authentication key or API key when request. No password is required only API key is enough for accessing the API. Now here, the problem is how to pass this API key with your request because if you will not provide this key it will not allow you to access Prestashop Webservice. The solution is while accessing the API from the mobile you need to pass this key in the header as BASIC AUTH.

When we add API Key with URL, Browsers are intelligent enough to understand it as username but the mobile web-services are not. So we need to pass it by building BASIC AUTH. We pass API Key as username and leave password blank as shown in below example:

Conclusion

The above-explained solution can help many developers to start PrestaShop mobile app with its web-services. Giant eCommerce companies are now focusing on improving end-user experience on mobile devices. They are providing a strong technology infrastructure via cutting-edge mobile applications. Prestashop is one of the popular eCommerce open-source platforms and it has taken an important place in the eCommerce market for developing e-store. Using Prestashop API for e-store can be proved to be an intelligent option.You can also browse other apps already developed with Prestashop Webservices for example- PrestaShopee ,Prestashop mobile. If you need any help and assistance regarding app, website etc. development feel free to contact us.

References

Prestashop is a free open-source which provides the solution for e-commerce. For more information, you can visit the following link PrestaShop.

PrestaShop provides documentation for the list of all basic APIs that are needed for the e-store.To get more details about the documentation you can visit this link PrestaShop Webservice

Sitemap

About Us

We are a small agile company delivering world class products and software development services for startups and small businesses. We specialize in developing online communities,e-commerce websites, custom websites, mobile apps and performance. Over the years, we have served over 350+ customers through our products and services. Read More